The Best Translation of Praise of Folly
Praise of Folly was written in Latin. 3 recommended editions, ranked — with Gröblé’s verdict on which to read first.
Betty Radice
Penguin Classics · 1993 · 188 pages
Radice catches the irony, which is the whole game. Folly's self-praise actually reads as funny in her English, and A.H.T. Levi's intro sets up the Renaissance humanism without bogging the book down.
Every recommended edition, compared
Miller's Yale is the scholar's choice. Precise and densely footnoted on every classical allusion and theological in-joke. Heavier going than Radice but more is unlocked.
Dean's 1946 American version is plain and direct, no apparatus to speak of. Less polished than Radice and less annotated than Miller, but worth keeping on the shelf for the unfussy American sentence Erasmus gets in it.
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Reading Praise of Folly in translation
Praise of Folly was written in Latin, so unless you read Latin, the translator decides the book you actually experience — its register, its pace, how it sounds read aloud. Two editions of the same work can feel like different books.
The ranking above is Gröblé’s: one reader’s verdict on which English gets you closest, not a publisher’s blurb. Start with the top pick; reach for the others when you want a different angle on the original.